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Crisis Crisis leadership during leadership COVID-19: the role of governors during in the United States COVID-19 Abdul-Akeem Sadiq, Naim Kapucu and Qian Hu 65 School of Public Administration, University of Central Florida, Orlando, Florida, USA Received 2 August 2020 Revised 8 October 2020 Accepted 18 November 2020 Abstract Purpose – The purpose of this viewpoint article is to understand crisis leadership during COVID-19 by examining the decision-making with respect to implementing COVID-19 mitigation measures, collaboration with stakeholders, and communication strategies of the governors of the States of California, Texas, Florida, and New York in the United States. Design/methodology/approach – This viewpoint article employs information from the extant literature on crisis leadership and secondary sources to understand the four governor’s crisis leadership strategies during COVID-19. Findings – Governors Gavin Newsom of California and Andrew Cuomo of New York made quicker decisions regarding implementing COVID-19 mitigation measures (e.g. shutting down the economy, mandating physical distancing, issuing stay-at-home orders, mandating wearing face covering in public and issuing a state of emergency) compared to Governors Greg Abbott of Texas and Ron DeSantis of Florida. In addition, all four governors collaborated with state and local governments, private entities, and nonprofits to address COVID-19. Finally, all four governors held some form of briefing on COVID-19 on a regular basis and used different media to get their information out to the public. Originality/value – This viewpoint article uses decision-making regarding implementation of mitigation strategies, collaboration with stakeholders, and crisis communication strategy to understand governors’ crisis leadership during COVID-19. Keywords Decision making, Collaboration, Communication, COVID-19, Pandemic, Crises leadership Paper type Viewpoint
Introduction Since the first confirmed case was reported on Jan 21, 2020 in Washington State, COVID-19 has quickly swept all 50 states in the United States in less than two months (Schumaker, 2020). On March 13, 2020, President Trump declared a national emergency and signed a two- trillion dollars stimulus bill (Schumaker, 2020). The number of newly infected cases decreased in April–May but surged again since mid-June, after many states gradually reopened their economies and loosened their “stay-at-home” orders. As of October 7, 2020, the Centers for disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has reported a total of 7,436,274 cases and 209,560 deaths in the US (2020). Such a catastrophic and transboundary pandemic has posed unprecedented leadership challenges to governments at all levels and demanded government leaders to communicate effectively and make timely decisions amid high uncertainty and political pressure (Blondin and Boin, 2020). The US federalist system leaves state governments with a lot of autonomy to mobilize resources and craft state-level crisis response plans (Kettl, 2020). State governments varied in their adoption and implementation of stay-at-home orders, face covering, and physical distancing measures (CDC, 2020), despite the scientific evidence supporting these mitigation International Journal of Public strategies to slow down the spread of COVID-19. Furthermore, due to the absence of federal Leadership Vol. 17 No. 1, 2021 leadership and lack of national coordination at the early stage of the pandemic response pp. 65-80 (Bowling et al., 2020; Rozell and Wilcox, 2020), state governments had to take active roles in © Emerald Publishing Limited 2056-4929 addressing the shortage of test kits and procuring personal protective equipment and DOI 10.1108/IJPL-08-2020-0071 IJPL ventilators (Hu et al., 2020; Mallinson, 2020, Sadiq and Kessa, 2020). Many governors hold 17,1 regular press briefings on their COVID-19 responses (Mallinson, 2020). While some governors (e.g. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo) were praised for providing decisive guidance and implementing necessary measures to flatten the curve, others (e.g. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis) were criticized for slow action in closing beaches and early reopening of the entertainment industry and restaurants (Mallinson, 2020). These different state-level responses to the COVID-19 pandemic provides a unique 66 study context for examining crisis leadership of governors during such a historic pandemic. Moreover, there is a need to understand the roles of crisis leadership of governors in the United States as the topic has not been studied extensively compared to federal and local level leaderships. As such, this viewpoint article addresses one primary question: What crisis leadership behaviors do state governors exhibit in response to the COVID-19 pandemic? In answering this question, this viewpoint article stresses the paramount role governors play as crisis leaders in response to the COVID- 19 pandemic and examines their decision-making regarding implementation of mitigation strategies, collaboration with other stakeholders, and crisis communication. In doing so, it highlights the variations and commonalities in decision-making among the four governors of the four most populated US states as they navigate the unprecedented challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic. We hope that this article would help us get a better understanding of which leadership strategies worked and which did not and use that knowledge as the basis for preparing for future pandemics or disasters. After briefly discussing crisis leadership, we select the four most populated US states— California, Texas, Florida and New York—and examine their governors’ leadership role with respect to decision-making on implementing mitigation strategies, their collaboration with other stakeholders, and crisis communication during the COVID-19 crisis. Through the analysis of governors’ crisis leadership, this viewpoint article illustrates the important role that governors play in shaping state-level crisis response based on federal policies and guidelines. While this article may not provide direct solutions to the challenges facing leaders during a pandemic, it will underscore the need for future research to reflect on existing scholarship on crisis leadership (Boin et al., 2016; Comfort, 2007; Kapucu et al., 2011), especially at the state governor level.
Crisis leadership Crises are unstructured events that occur outside organizational leaders’ typical range of operations. Lack of leadership during crisescanmakemattersworseandtheimpactofa crisis unmanageable. Crisis leadership requires having contingency plans to prevent crisis or reduce potential impact, prepare for effective response and timely recovery, and return the affected community to normalcy as quickly as possible (Kapucu and Van Wart, 2008). Crises create uncertain, complex, dynamic situations, which can be characterized by an overload of incomplete and sometime conflicting information. Under this uncertain and dynamic environments of crises, leadership requires rapid comprehension of risk, selection and processing information, timely search and exchange of information across many agencies and jurisdictions, the capacity to anticipate potential risk and the ability to make timely decisions during crisis response (Boin et al., 2010; Comfort, 2007; Comfort et al., 2020). Furthermore, leaders have to contemplate the following: how to define and interpret what is happening; why it is happening; and what needs to be done to mitigate the crisis (Hart and Tindall, 2009). This viewpoint article focuses on decision-making, collaboration, and crisis communication as core elements of crisis leadership. Decision-making Crisis Crises have the potential to produce substantial harm to people and property in any society leadership (Sadiq, 2017). Effectiveness and capacity of leaders in their timely decision-making in response to crises can reduce the negative impact of crises. Limited capacity or lack of during effectiveness in leadership decision-making will make the matters worse and bring more COVID-19 negative impact of crises on people and communities (Kapucu and Van Wart, 2006; Kapucu et al., 2011). Learning from past crises and disasters can help leaders make timely and better decisions in response to crises in terms of pre-planning, policies, and putting appropriate 67 structures in place to protect people and properties. Crises are major tests for leaders’ ability to function effectively in high-pressure and uncertain environments. Crises, such as a pandemic, require collective and inclusive decision-making and stakeholder collaboration for success (Kapucu and Van Wart, 2006; Sylves, 2006). For elected public leaders, appointing well-prepared and trained professionals in handling crises is also critical as they do not have time to understand different types of crises and gain expertise in dealing with them (Kapucu et al., 2011).
Collaboration Collaboration skills are also essential for effective leadership when responding to crises (Waugh and Streib, 2006). Effectiveness of collaboration is determined by the degree to which participating organizations share their resources and align major tasks and functions to accomplish a shared objective. Major crises response efforts require collaboration among diverse organizations from public, private, and nonprofit sectors as well as different levels of government. During crises, people will ask “who is in charge?” and look for a collaboration and coordination structure, chain of command, and guidance for a collective network response to crises (Moynihan, 2009; Sexton et al., 2007). In complex and uncertain environments of crisis situations, leaders need to effectively facilitate collaboration across organizations from different sectors for timely decisions and effective implementation of plans and policies to achieve a common goal (Crosby and Bryson, 2010). In dealing with COVID-19, governors in the US faced challenges on how to facilitate the crisis response efforts with both federal and local governments, private entities, and nonprofit organizations to slow the spread of the virus and reopen their economies.
Communication Crisis communication is critical not just to share information and knowledge among organizations who are part of the crisis response efforts but also to give citizens who are impacted by the virus relevant information (Kapucu, 2006; Littlefield and Quenette, 2007). Communication can be defined as connecting the sender and the receiver on a platform with a common understanding of the message (Luhman, 1989). Effective communication during crises depends on evidence-based strategies, organized in a way that every member of diverse communities can understand easily, and presented and disseminated in multiple ways and outlets for positive impact (Bowser and Cutter, 2015; Kapucu et al., 2008). Collaboration with the media and handling criticism with positive leadership attitudes are also noted by scholars as critical because leading during crisis is different thanleadinginnormaltimes(Boin et al.,2010). Convincing people regarding risk and potential harm of a novel virus without prior experience is not easy and it will require strong leadership, trust, consistent message, and evidence-based information for public participation. Acting decisively, creating a structure and culture to collaborate with stakeholders, and communicating effectively are critical leadership competencies in dealing with crises. IJPL Health crisis decision-making structure in the US 17,1 The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted the global community. Due to the nature and impact of this pandemic, the US crisis decision-making structure to address this public health crisis includes global, national, state, and local actors. The World health Organization (WHO) is the major global actor in terms of facilitating information flow among nations. Unfortunately, WHO was not fully supported by the global community, especially by the US government (Nature, 2020). 68 At the federal level, the CDC within the Department of Health and Human Services takes the lead and plays a major role in responding to the health crisis. Although, the CDC handles US medical surge capacity and capability management system, the CDC was not fully funded, and the director position was vacant for several months in early 2017. A White House COVID- 19 Task Force (ad hoc advisory group) was created on January 29, 2020 to coordinate the federal response. Vice President Mike Pence chaired this advisory group. One of the most critical federal agencies that played a significant role in logistics coordination is the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). FEMA’s Emergency Support Function (ESF) 8, public health and medical services and ESF 3, public works and engineering were most critical. FEMA came to the crisis response operations late and delayed coordination with state and local authorities for distribution of resources and supply chain stabilization. At the state level, the governors and state health departments play a substantial role in response to COVID-19. Governors’ declaration of an emergency determines the activation of emergency response plans, emergency operation centers, personnel, equipment, stockpiles, and other resources. According to the 1988 Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act, to receive federal assistance, governors of the affected states need to send formal requests to the president to declare a major disaster or an emergency (Sylves, 2019). Since all the states were impacted by COVID-19, the Emergency Management Assistance Compact was not fully utilized to get assistance from states to states despite the variability among the states in terms of resources, population density, and availability of information. Similar to coordination issues between federal government and the states, coordination problems occurred between the state governors and local mayors and other local authorities (Haffajee and Mello, 2020). Furthermore, some state governors respected science and used evidence for decision-making while others did not. At the local level, the mayors, local health department heads, and emergency managers played a pivotal role in dealing with COVID-19. Local governments also varied in terms of capacity, information availability, and level of communication with the public. Some localities established task forces to help reopen their economies. The task forces included health experts, businesspeople, and public leaders, among others. Major trade-off was reopening the economy and balancing public health concerns. This was not an easy decision for any level of government. Some of the major mitigation strategies used, consistent with WHO and CDC guidelines, were stay-at-home, physical distancing, and the use of face covering in public.
Governors as crisis leaders during COVID-19 in the US In this viewpoint article, we use four states to illustrate the crisis leadership role of governors during COVID-19 crisis response—California, Texas, Florida and New York. We selected these four states because they are the four most populous states in the US, are the top four states for the number of COVID-19 cases (as of July 31, 2020), and have high COVID-19 deaths (CDC, 2020). We examine these governors’ crisis leadership by focusing on their decision-making, collaboration, and crisis communication. Specifically, we use the following criteria: (1) Implementation of mitigation strategies—shut down and reopen the economy, order physical distancing, issue stay-at-home order, mandate face covering in public, issue self-quarantine mandate for individuals returning from states with high rate of COVID-19 infections, and Crisis declare a state of emergency in a timely manner; (2) Collaboration with stakeholders (e.g. leadership other levels of government, private entities, and nonprofits) and (3) Governors’ crisis communication strategy, such as frequency of COVID-19 press briefings, diversity of media during outlets for COVID-19 press briefings, the use of data and scientific evidence during COVID-19 COVID-19 press briefings, and whether the governors use an American Sign Language interpreter during their COVID-19 press briefings. 69
California Decision-making regarding implementation of mitigation strategies In response to COVID-19, the Governor of California, Gavin Newsom, shut down California’s economy on March 16, 2020 (Calmatters, 2020) and reopened it on May 8, 2020 (California Government, 2020). The Governor declared a state of emergency on March 6, 2020 (Executive Department State of California, 2020), mandated physical distancing in public places on March 12, 2020, and issued a shelter-in-place order on March 19, 2020 (Office of Governor Gavin Newsom, 2020a). In addition, Governor Newsom issued a mandate for Californians to wear a face covering in public on June 18, 2020 (California Department of Public Health, 2020). However, Governor Newsom did not issue a mandate for those travelling from states with high COVID-19 infections to self-quarantine for 14 days to reduce the spread of COVID-19 (Ballotpedia, 2020). See Figure 1 for the number of confirmed cases and Governor Newsom’s closing and reopening policies.
Collaboration with stakeholders Governor Newsom lent the federal government 500 ventilators to be distributed to other states in dire need, and the federal government placed some sterilization units for masks in the state so that masks can be sterilized and reused (Calmatters, 2020). Governor Newsom partnered with the Governors of Oregon and Washington, Kate Brown and Jay Inslee, respectively to develop a vision for reopening the economies of the three states and develop strategies for combatting COVID-19 (Office of Governor Gavin Newsom, 2020b). Furthermore, Governor Newsom
10,000
5,000 New Confirmed Cases
2 Cases 21 cumulative cases Figure 1. 0 Number of confirmed Feb 1Mar 2 Apr 1 May 1 Jun 1 Jul 1 cases and California State government’s Restriction/closing Opening Deferring decisions to country Other closing and reopening policies Source(s): John Hopkins Centers for Civic Impact, 2020 IJPL partnered with local counties to close vehicular traffic in some parks to reduce the density of 17,1 park visitors and minimize the spread of COVID-19 (California Department of Parks and Recreation, 2020). In addition, Governor Newsom partnered with Tesla and Apple to obtain more ventilators and additional medical masks, respectively (Bollag, 2020). Finally, Governor Newsom created a Californians For All website that would enable individuals willing to support nonprofit organizations (e.g. deliver meals, donate blood, and distribute hygiene kits) during COVID-19 to sign up as volunteer corps (Koseff, 2020). 70 Crisis communication strategy Governor Newsom initially held daily COVID-19 briefings, but later the briefings became occasional, and there were times when he cancelled some briefings (Martichoux, 2020). Governor Newsom broadcast his COVID-19 briefings via his Twitter page, other social media outlets, and TV stations (Office of Governor Gavin Newsom, 2020c). Most of his presentations during the briefings were supported by scientific evidence and data (Haskell and Martichoux, 2020). Furthermore, Governor Newsom constantly used a sign-language interpreter during his COVID-19 press briefings (Hubler, 2020).
Texas Decision-making regarding implementation of mitigation strategies The Governor of Texas, Greg Abbott, shut down the economy of Texas on March 19, 2020, and allowed some parks to start operating again on April 20, 2020 (Escobedo, 2020; Medley, 2020). The Governor reopened the entire Texas economy on May 1, 2020 (Escobedo, 2020). Governor Abbott declared a state of emergency on March 13, 2020 (Escobedo, 2020), issued a physical distancing mandate on april 2, 2020 (Office of the Texas Governor, 2020a), and declared a stay-at-home order from April 2, 2020 to April 30, 2020 (Escobedo, 2020). In addition, Governor Abbott issued a mandate for face covering in public on July 3, 2020 (The Guardian, 2020) and issued an executive order of 14-day self-quarantine for anyone flying to Texas from Connecticut, New York, New Orleans, and New Jersey (Reding et al., 2020). Figure 2 shows the number of confirmed cases and Governor Abbott’s closing and reopening policies.
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5,000 New Confirmed Cases 1 Cases 4 cumulative cases
Figure 2. 0 Number of confirmed Feb 1Mar 6 Apr 1 May 1 Jun 1 Jul 1 cases and Texas State government’s closing Restriction/closing Opening Deferring decisions to country Other and reopening policies Source(s): John Hopkins Centers for Civic Impact, 2020 Collaboration with stakeholders Crisis At the request of Governor Abbott, the federal government deployed US Army Urban leadership Augmentation Medical Task Forces (UAMTF) to supplement the medical resources of the state to combat COVID-19 (Office of the Texas Governor, 2020b). Governor Abbott during collaborated with counties experiencing increases in hospitalizations as a result of COVID-19 COVID-19—Dallas, Travis, Harris and Bexar—to suspend elective surgeries in some of their hospitals to free up hospital beds for COVID-19 victims (Office of the Texas Governor, 2020c). Furthermore, Governor Abbott aligned with Omnicare, a CVS Health company, to 71 offer COVID-19 point-of-care testing to nursing homes and assisted living centers (Office of the Texas Governor, 2020d).
Crisis communication strategy Governor Abbott initially held regular state-wide press briefings on COVID-19 via national TV networks and the Governor’s website, but has not held one since May 5, 2020 (Blackman, 2020). Instead, Governor Abbott has been using local TV outlets to get his messages about COVID-19 to Texans (Blackman, 2020). Governor Abbott used data and scientific evidence during his COVID-19 press briefings (Harris and Blackman, 2020). In addition, the Governor used social media to broadcast COVID-19 information. He also used a sign-language interpreter on a regular basis during his COVID-19 press briefings (East, 2020)
Florida Decision-making regarding implementation of mitigation strategies The Governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, shut down parts of Florida’s economy on March 17, 2020, and allowed some beaches and parks to reopen on april 17, 2020 (Cutway, 2020). The economy was later reopened on May 4, 2020 (Stoddart et al., 2020). Governor DeSantis declared a state of emergency on March 13, 2020, issued a stay-at-home order from April 3, 2020 to April 30, 2020, and on March 23, 2020, mandated those travelling from select states with high COVID-19 infections to self-quarantine for 14 days to reduce the spread of COVID-19 (Cutway, 2020; Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, 2020). However, Governor DeSantis neither issued a state-wide physical distancing order (National Governors Association, 2020) nor issued any state-wide mandate on face covering in public (he allowed individual counties to issue their mandates) (News Break, 2020). See Figure 3 for the number of confirmed cases in Florida and the closing and reopening policies of Governor DeSantis.
Collaboration with stakeholders Governor DeSantis is working with the federal government to increase testing in his state, and the federal government has supplied the experimental drug remdesivir used to help patients recover quicker from COVID-19 to the state (Reyes, 2020). Governor DeSantis is part of a COVID-19 coalition of six states—Georgia, Mississippi, Louisiana, Tennessee, South Carolina, and Alabama—coming together to open their economies (Dixon, 2020). Furthermore, Governor DeSantis held a roundtable discussion with the Mayors of Miami- Dade County on ways to fight COVID-19, and specifically, how to increase contact tracing (Scouten, 2020). Governor DeSantis also worked with Home Depot and Publix to create more COVID-19 testing sites (Executive Office of Governor Ron DeSantis, 2020). The Florida Division of Emergency Management will provide the personnel and personal protective equipment to be used at the additional testing sites (Executive Office of Governor Ron DeSantis, 2020). IJPL 17,1 15,000
10,000 72
5,000 New Confirmed Cases
0 Cases 0 cumulative cases
Figure 3. 0 Number of confirmed Feb 1Mar 1 Apr 1 May 1 Jun 1 Jul 1 cases and Florida State government’s closing Restriction/closing Opening Deferring decisions to country Other and reopening policies Source(s): John Hopkins Centers for Civic Impact, 2020
Crisis communication strategy Governor DeSantis holds frequent news briefings on COVID-19 (Dado, 2020; WESH 2 News, 2020). In terms of the diversity of media outlets for his COVID-19 briefings, Governor DeSantis used local TV stations and the internet, and social media outlets, especially Twitter to communicate with the public (Dado, 2020; WESH 2 News, 2020). The use of data and scientific evidence by Governor DeSantis during his COVID-19 briefings were not evident, and politics not science has been the basis of his decision-making (Wootson et al., 2020). The Governor did not use a sign-language interpreter during his COVID-19 briefings (Teproff, 2020) and he was sued by Disability Rights Florida. Not having a sign-language interpreter at the governor’s COVID-19 briefings made it difficult for those who are deaf or hard of hearing to access COVID-19 information presented during the briefings.
New York Decision-making regarding implementation of mitigation strategies In a bid to reduce the spread of COVID-19, the Governor of New York, Andrew Cuomo shut down New York’s economy on March 16, 2020 (CBS 6 News, 2020) and reopened it on May 15, 2020 (Stoddart et al., 2020). Governor Cuomo mandated physical distancing in public places on March 22, 2020 (New York State, 2020) and issued a stay-at-home order on March 22, 2020 (CBS 6 News, 2020). In addition, Governor Cuomo declared a state of emergency as a result of COVID-19 on March 7, 2020 and required New Yorkers to wear a face covering in public on april 17, 2020 (CBS 6 News, 2020). On June 24, 2020, Governor Cuomo issued a mandate for those travelling from states with high COVID-19 infections to self-quarantine for 14 days to reduce the spread of COVID-19 (CBS 6 News, 2020). Figure 4 shows the number of confirmed cases and Governor Cuomo’s closing and reopening policies.
Collaboration with stakeholders Governor Cuomo collaborated with the federal government to double the rate of COVID-19 testing in the state by ramping up diagnostic test by private labs (CBS 6 News, 2020; Escobedo, 2020). Governor Cuomo also collaborated with other state governors to share Crisis leadership 10,000 during COVID-19 8,000 73 6,000
4,000 New Confirmed Cases
2,000 0 Cases 1 cumulative cases Figure 4. 0 Number of confirmed Feb 1Mar 2 Apr 1 May 1 Jun 1 Jul 1 cases and New York State government’s Restriction/closing Opening Deferring decisions to country Other closing and reopening policies Source(s): John Hopkins Centers for Civic Impact, 2020 resources to fight COVID-19 and to coordinate the reopening of their economies (CBS 6 News, 2020). For example, Governor Cuomo donated 100 ventilators to the State of New Jersey and coordinated with the Governors of Connecticut, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Massachusetts to open their economies (CBS 6 News, 2020). Furthermore, Governor Cuomo partners with local governments both within and outside his state to fight COVID-19. For example, Governor Cuomo partnered with New York City to distribute 1 million masks to severely impacted New York City neighborhoods (Office of the New York Governor, 2020) and he is working with the City of Savannah, Georgia to combat COVID-19 by providing expertise and resources (e.g. face masks, test kits, and gowns) (Evans, 2020). Finally, Governor Cuomo partnered with private entities to increase COVID-19 testing and received a donation of 500,000 testing kits from a private company called Regeneron (CBS 6 News, 2020).
Crisis communication strategy Governor Cuomo held daily press briefing on COVID-19 from March 2020 to Mid-June 2020 and since then continued to hold press briefings only when necessary (Singman, 2020). His briefings can be streamed online or watched on national TV (e.g. CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC), local TV networks, and websites (Campbell, 2020; Singman, 2020). In addition, Governor Cuomo used social media outlets, such as Twitter and Facebook effectively as part of his communication strategy, and his use of data and scientific evidence during his press briefings is impressive (Campbell, 2020). The Governor typically used PowerPoint slides containing charts, maps, and graphics to present COVID-19 data (Campbell, 2020). In terms of using a sign language interpreter, Governor Cuomo did not provide a live sign-language interpretation for his COVID-19 briefings for about two months, and he was sued by a disability rights group as a result (Precious, 2020). The Governor’s lawyer argued that the Governor already provided closed captioning and an American Sign Language stream of his COVID-19 briefings (Precious, 2020). As a result of the limitations of these two approaches, such as potential errors in closed captioning, among other factors, the judge ruled in favor of the disability group, and the Governor began to provide live American Sign Language interpretation during his COVID-19 briefings (Precious, 2020). IJPL New 17,1 State California Texas Florida York
Date shut down was mandated 3/16/2020 3/19/2020 3/17/2020 3/16/2020 Date state’s economy was reopened 5/8/2020 5/1/2020 5/4/2020 5/15/2020 Date physical distancing was mandated 3/12/2020 4/2/2020 5/4/2020 3/22/2020 Date stay-at-home order was issued 3/19/2020 4/2/2020 4/3/2020 3/22/2020 74 Date mandate on wearing face covering in public was 6/18/2020 7/3/2020 NAa 4/17/2020 issued Date self-quarantine mandate for those returning from NAb 3/28/2020 3/23/2020 6/24/2020 Table 1. Dates of states with high rate of COVID-19 infections was issued implementation of Date state of emergency was declared 3/6/2020 3/13/2020 3/9/2020 3/7/2020 COVID-19 mitigation Note(s): aGovernor DeSantis did not issue a statewide mandate but allows counties to issue their mandates strategies bGovernor Newsom did not issue a travel restriction as of July 13, 2020
Table 1 presents information on the four governors’ decision-making with respect to mitigation strategies and their dates of implementation. It is clear from Table 1 that, in general, Governors Newsom and Cuomo are much quicker to make decisions regarding the implementation of mitigation strategies for COVID-19 compared to Governors Abbott and DeSantis. For example, Governors Newsom and Cuomo were quicker than Governors Abbott and DeSantis to shut down their economies, mandate physical distancing, issue stay-at-home orders, mandate wearing face covering in public, and issue a state of emergency. This finding is in line with the argument that the approaches of both Governors Abbott and DeSantis closely mirror that of President Trump (Weixel, 2020). Our findings also support the fact that Governor Cuomo was applauded for his decisive guidance, clear and frequent crisis communication, and coordination with the federal government, other state governments, local governments, and private entities (Mallinson, 2020). In terms of collaboration, all four governors collaborated with state and local governments, private entities, and nonprofits to fight COVID-19. It is interesting to note that with the exception of Governor Abbott, the other three governors collaborated with multiple states within their regions. With regards to crisis communication, all four governors held some form of briefing on COVID-19 on a regular basis and used different media to get their information out to the public. All the governors except for Governor DeSantis used data and scientific evidence during their COVID-19 briefings. The use of a sign language interpreter varied a bit among the governors. Governors Newsom and Abbott regularly used sign language interpreters while Governors DeSantis and Cuomo did not use sign language interpreters on a regular basis. In fact, both governors were sued by disability rights groups for not using sign language interpreters. Governor Cuomo later began to use a sign language interpreter after a judge ruled in favor of the disability group. However, as at this writing, we are not aware of Governor DeSantis using a sign language interpreter during his COVID-19 briefings.
Conclusion This viewpoint article examines the crisis leadership of governors in the four most populated states of the United States in response to COVID-19. In times of a public health crisis, governors’ decisive guidance, effective crisis communication, and collaboration with relevant stakeholders are paramount. Among a multitude of political, economic, administrative, and cultural factors, governors’ decisions on mitigation strategies heavily influence whether states will implement stricter mitigation measures and how local governments adopt and implement specific response plans. Facing high level of uncertainty, governors’ decisive Crisis actions and crisis communication strategies will not only protect frontline responders, but leadership also instill confidence in citizens to overcome panicking behaviors during a crisis. Furthermore, dealing with such a transboundary crisis, governors’ ability to collaborate during with a diverse set of stakeholders impact their state’s capacity to build coalitions and mobilize COVID-19 resources quickly. Although the four governors share common measures to slow down the spread of the virus, their executive orders differ in terms of the speed of reopening their economies. All four 75 governors communicate with citizens via briefings on crisis response; however, they differ in the frequency of their communication, the use of data and scientific evidence, use of diverse media outlets, and the use of an American Sign Language interpreter during their COVID-19 briefings. It should be noted that these governors vary in terms of their formal powers as defined by state constitutions and their informal powers that are more a function of experience, partisan alignment, personal style, and public approval. It is beyond the scope of this viewpoint article to explain governors’ adoption of different crisis response measures or empirically test the influence of governors’ decisions on controlling the crisis. Future research should take an explanatory approach to investigate the variations in governors’ crisis leadership behaviors during the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, researchers should examine the extent to which variations in governors’ leadership behaviors influence the effectiveness of state response to the pandemic.
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IJPL About the authors Dr. Abdul-Akeem Sadiq is an associate professor in the School of Public 17,1 Administration at the University of Central Florida. He is also the Director of the Master of Public Administration and Master of Public Policy programs. His research focuses on community flood risk management, organizational disaster preparedness, mass fatality management, and collaborative governance. Abdul-Akeem Sadiq is the corresponding author and can be contacted at: [email protected] 80 Naim Kapucu, Ph.D., is Pegasus professor of public administration and policy at the School of Public Administration at the University of Central Florida (UCF). His research interests are emergency and crisis management, decision-making in complex environments, network governance, and leadership. His work has been published in Public Administration Review, Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, the American Review of Public Administration, and Disasters, among others. He teaches network governance, leadership, and methods. Qian Hu, Ph.D., is an associate professor in the School of Public Administration at the University of Central Florida. Her current research interests include emergency management networks, collaborative governance, organizational network research, and scholarship of teaching and learning. Her work has been published in academic journals such as Public Administration Review, the Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, Public Management Review, American Review of Public Administration, Administration and Society, and the Journal of Urban Affairs.
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